It’s no secret that beer tourism is a serious and growing thing, but CNN’s website has an interesting report this week on the new high end of the market, with resorts and breweries trying to offer the kind of high-touch, luxury experiences that wine lovers have long expected from pricey wineries and resorts. They list 10 expensive beer-related vacation options, including the famous Trapp Family Lodge in Stowe, Vermont, founded by the “Sound of Music” family. In 2012, Maria and Georg’s son Johannes von Trapp established an Austrian-style brewery at the resort.

A spa known as The Lodge at Woodloch in Hawley, Pennsylvania, meanwhile, has added beer to its mud baths and other services (not just to drink, mind you, but also applied to the skin – seems like a sad waste of good beer, but what do I know?).

The closest options for us are the Hop ‘N Bed at Chatoe Rogue at Rogue Brewing in Oregon, which opened in 2010, and the Bonaventure Hotel in Los Angeles, which added a brew pub way back in 1998.

Seems odd that nobody here in beer-rich Beer Country has thought of this yet. Business opportunity, anyone?

Speaking of over-the-top beer vacation experiences, several news organizations have reported lately about Starkenberger Brewery, built in a castle in Bavaria, where for only about $300 each, you and your drinking buddies can bathe in pools of its beer. Whatever floats your boat, I guess, but I’d rather drink the stuff.

-Sean Scully